Abba to Zappa | The Guardianhttps://www.theguardian.com/music/series/abbatozappa
The blog from the writers and editors of Observer Music Monthlyen-gbGuardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. 2016Sat, 10 Dec 2016 03:29:40 GMT2016-12-10T03:29:40Zen-gbGuardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. 2016The Guardianhttps://assets.guim.co.uk/images/guardian-logo-rss.c45beb1bafa34b347ac333af2e6fe23f.pnghttps://www.theguardian.com
Inky Fingers: Maggoty Lamb dines out on the leftovers from the New Yorker's Thanksgiving turkeyhttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/dec/17/maggoty-lamb-new-yorker
The New Yorker likes to celebrate the festive season with a dodgy musical proposition – this year, that hip-hop is dead<p>This time of year is all about traditions. The Germans like to eat pickles on Christmas Eve. The Rough Trade shops' <a href="http://www.roughtrade.com/site/content.lasso?page=aoy_2009.html">top ten albums list</a> always includes at least one record that has been randomly elevated far above its rightful station in the rump of some generic indie sub-category as testimony to the RT brand's enduring maverick sensibility (this year it's Survival by Forest Fire). And New Yorker pop critic Sasha Frere-Jones usually opts to celebrate the coming of the winter solstice by advancing an argument full of holes big enough for Santa to drive his sleigh through.</p><p><a href="http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/musical/2009/10/26/091026crmu_music_frerejones">2009's entry into this canon</a> put forward the proposition that the year that has just passed is the one in which hip-hop can confidently be said to have "died". Proclaiming the demise of one major form of musical endeavour or another has never really been a good critical look. (Remember the early 90s, when Tony Parsons ushered in the Britpop era by going on Channel 4 to tell us that British pop music would never again have the power to touch the lives of millions?) And given that pretty much the only concrete evidence Jones cites is that <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/jayz">Jay-Z</a>'s The Blueprint 3 is not as good as The Black Album, (no shit, Sherlock, and yet, Jay's decline is nowhere near as vertiginous as the jump in quality from Mos Def's last album to 2009's The Ecstatic, so where does that leave us?) and <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/dec/03/death-of-hip-hop">Alex MacPherson (against)</a> and <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2009/nov/26/notes-noughties-hip-hop">Simon Reynolds (for)</a> have already gone mano a mano here on the whole hip-hop-is-dead issue, it would be tempting to leave this particular cold potato in the back of the fridge with the uneaten bread sauce, were Frere-Jones's entire theory not predicated on a jaw-dropping (and as yet publicly unremarked) colonialist assumption.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/dec/17/maggoty-lamb-new-yorker">Continue reading...</a>MusicPop and rockCultureHip-hopThe New YorkerTue, 22 Dec 2009 11:04:55 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/dec/17/maggoty-lamb-new-yorkerPhotograph: Public DomainMags perused by Maggoty this monthPhotograph: Public DomainMags perused by Maggoty this monthMaggoty Lamb2009-12-22T11:04:55ZInky Fingers: Maggoty Lamb enjoys the latest hip-hop beefhttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/nov/19/maggoty-lamb
From Hip Hop Weekly to the Source, urban music magazines offer a mixed approach to covering rap's inner conflicts<p>What was I thinking? After two and a half years of striving to inspire a heated debate with an outmoded combination of impassioned polemic and old-school Bernstein and Woodward-style investigative journalism, last month's bulging crop of enraged responses confirmed that all you need to do to really get the wires humming is casually drop in a dismissive aside about Interpol or Spoon. But how best to pass the time until next month's no-stone-unturned analysis of the terrifying possibility that neither Broken Social Scene nor the Bowerbirds are currently among the world's top 10 rock bands? A spot-check on the current state of Anglo-American urban music magazine publishing seems the only realistic way forward.</p><p>On the middle-shelf of a small newsagents in Hackney's once bustling Dalston Lane, there lurks what seems to be the entire UK stock of a publication called <a href="http://hiphopweeklyblog.com/">Hip Hop Weekly</a>. This disturbingly entertaining magazine views the triumphs and tribulations of all your favourite rap stars (and a few you've never heard of) through the same filter of amoral obsequiousness that Hello! used to – and, for all I know, still does – apply to the social lives of minor European royals. Thus paparazzi shots of Yung Joc's birthday bash at Velvet Room in Atlanta ("Shawty Lo never misses an industry event") nestle comfortably alongside "Beach Bodies" Eve and Beyoncé.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/nov/19/maggoty-lamb">Continue reading...</a>Pop and rockMusicCultureHip-hopRapMon, 23 Nov 2009 12:23:20 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/nov/19/maggoty-lambPhotograph: Michael WhitakerMixed messages ... hip-hop mags struggle to find consistent coverage. Photograph: Michael WhitakerPhotograph: Michael WhitakerMixed messages ... hip-hop mags struggle to find consistent coverage. Photograph: Michael WhitakerMaggoty Lamb2009-11-23T12:23:20ZThe Record Doctor respondshttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/nov/01/record-doctor
After years of dealing with celebrity patients, Observer Music Monthly's Record Doctor has extended his working hours and opened his clinic to all-comers. Here are his latest responses to your queries<p><em>I saw Teenage Fanclub at a festival in the summer and thought they were great. My flatmate says they've nicked their sound from Big Star. I like a few of Big Star's tracks I've found online but none of their albums are on Spotify. What would be the best album to buy? </em><br><strong>Douglas</strong></p><p>There is some debate as to which is the best Big Star album but rest assured, both their debut, #1 Record, and its follow-up, Radio City, are unlikely to disappoint. The first, released in 1972, is notable for Thirteen and Ballad of El Goodo; the second boasts September Gurls, the great powerpop track, and Back of a Car. Sadly, both LPs were flops. The good news, though, is that they've been repackaged as one set, leaving you to find <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Bell_%28musician%29">Chris Bell</a>'s I am the Cosmos, the only album by the group's original guitarist who died in a car accident in 1978. For a taster, obtain the Flaming Lips' Late Night Tales, the highlight of which is Bell's heartbreaking Speed of Sound.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/nov/01/record-doctor">Continue reading...</a>MusicCultureSun, 01 Nov 2009 00:05:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/nov/01/record-doctorPhotograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverPhotograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverPaul Mardles2009-11-01T00:05:00ZInky Fingers: Maggoty Lamb on the noughties retrospectiveshttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/oct/15/maggoty-lamb-noughties
Are the 44 best albums of the last decade really all made by white people? Is Outkast's B.O.B. really better than Crazy in Love?<p>As the decade draws to an end, the English language seems to be trying to pull us back from the abyss of retrospective indulgence. After all, is it even possible to provide a serious, critical evaluation of a 10-year span in history when you have to call it "the Noughties"?</p><p>"OK, it was fun to look back at the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s," seems to be the general message, "but perhaps this time around, we should take a break. And let's maybe give the whole decade thing a rest for the next 10 years too, as 'The 10s' isn't really going to cut it either. Then we can have another go in the 2020s, and just think how fresh the whole process will seem by then!" </p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/oct/15/maggoty-lamb-noughties">Continue reading...</a>Pop and rockMusicCultureIndieMon, 19 Oct 2009 10:26:53 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/oct/15/maggoty-lamb-noughtiesPhotograph: Michael WhitakerMojo, Pitchfork and Uncut lead the noughties roundups. Photograph: Michael WhitakerPhotograph: Michael WhitakerMojo, Pitchfork and Uncut lead the noughties roundups. Photograph: Michael WhitakerInky Fingers2009-10-19T10:26:53ZThe Record Doctor respondshttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/oct/04/1
After years of dealing with celebrity patients, Observer Music Monthly's Record Doctor has extended his working hours and opened his clinic to all-comers. Here are his latest responses to your queries<p><em>Back in the 80s I received my political education via the work of the great <br>Billy Bragg. Who are 2009's political pop chroniclers?</em><br><strong>Emily </strong></p><p>You and me both, Emily. These days, however, there are very few singer-songwriters who perform a similar rule. In fact, assuming you have the stomach for elemental, frothing-at-the-mouth punk, your best bet is Gallows, whose second album Grey Britain rages at the BNP, bankers and clergymen. Yes, it lacks the biting wit of Billy Bragg – gags aren't really part of their repertoire, unless you count lines such as "There is nothing left for me: I want to kill myself for relief" amusing – but, boy, is frontman Frank Carter hopping mad. <br>Otherwise, seek out two of Bragg's contemporaries, soul-punk trio the <a href="http://www.myspace.com/redskinsunofficial">Redskins</a> – two of whom were members of the Socialist Workers party – and Glasgow's equally committed <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easterhouse_(band)">Easterhouse</a>. The latter's 1969, in particular, recalls the class struggles particular to the age: "You have to draw the line sometime, and I draw mine at Labour's house-trained socialists, the lowest form of hypocrite/ Who talk when the chips are down but stay loyal to the King and crown." <br><em><br>I'm a big fan of Empire of the Sun. I've heard that one of the group, Luke Steele, used to be in another band. That aside, I know nothing about them. Who were they and would I be a fan? </em><br><strong>David, Lancaster</strong></p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/oct/04/1">Continue reading...</a>MusicCultureSat, 03 Oct 2009 23:05:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/oct/04/1Photograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverPhotograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverPaul Mardles2009-10-03T23:05:00ZInky Fingers: Maggoty Lamb on the state of the nation's jazz mags | Maggoty Lambhttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/sep/22/maggoty-lamb-jazz-mags
What kind of public service is this column offering by simply saying nice things about The Wire every couple of months? The time has come to get down and dirty with the real stuff<p>It was a lovely, late summer afternoon. In <a href="http://www.foyles.co.uk/rays.asp">Ray's Jazz</a> on the top floor of Foyles bookshop in London's Charing Cross road, the elegantly-dressed woman approaching the counter with two <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CTtR8RofgQ">Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis</a> albums under her arm suddenly gave an involuntary start. Out of the corner of her eye, she had caught sight of the jazz magazines. </p><p>There on the counter – not even on any sort of raised shelving, and with no warning notice of any kind - were the August issues of <a href="http://www.jazzjournal.co.uk/">Jazz Journal</a> and <a href="http://www.jazzwise.com/catalog/">Jazzwise</a>. The covers of these magazines seemed specifically designed to induce a double take on the part of the unwary consumer. The former focused in on the very big face of Lee Konitz, the latter offered a truly terrifying photo of British eminence John Surman. Admittedly, it was intimidating stuff, but over the next few weeks these images began to haunt me.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/sep/22/maggoty-lamb-jazz-mags">Continue reading...</a>Pop and rockMusicCultureWed, 23 Sep 2009 08:13:03 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/sep/22/maggoty-lamb-jazz-magsPhotograph: Michael WhitakerThe covers of Jazzwise and Jazz Journal. Photograph: Michael WhitakerPhotograph: Michael WhitakerThe covers of Jazzwise and Jazz Journal. Photograph: Michael WhitakerMaggoty Lamb2009-09-23T08:13:03ZInky Fingers: Maggoty Lamb wonders if one name is being forgotten in the rush to close the doors of rock's journalistic pantheonhttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/aug/19/inky-fingers-maggoty-lamb
The trend of women taking over the editor's chair has prompted a frenzied outbreak of navel-gazing in the upper echelons of UK rock journalism<p>"It feels so unnatural to sing your own name," Peter Gabriel modestly observes, shortly after doing exactly that in the course of his and Hot Chip's joint cover version of Vampire Weekend's Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa. On first hearing this jaunty act of reappropriation earlier this year, it just seemed like a good joke. Eight months later, it can be seen to have been a sombre portent of an especially frenzied outbreak of navel-gazing in the upper echelons of UK rock journalism. </p><p>In recent weeks this virus has reached pandemic proportions, mutating from erstwhile Emap bigwig John Harris's auteurist hearkening back to an imaginary golden age in <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/jun/27/music-writing-bangs-marcus">this very paper</a>, to the apparently endless requiem for the rock writer's not-so-humble trade published by <a href="http://drownedinsound.com/lists/ismusicjournalismdead">Drowned In Sound</a>.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/aug/19/inky-fingers-maggoty-lamb">Continue reading...</a>Pop and rockMusicCultureMusic documentaryTue, 25 Aug 2009 10:21:21 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/aug/19/inky-fingers-maggoty-lambPhotograph: Michael WhitakerBoys' club? ... a dramatic adjustment to rock criticism's gender bias is underway. Photograph: Michael WhitakerPhotograph: Michael WhitakerBoys' club? ... a dramatic adjustment to rock criticism's gender bias is underway. Photograph: Michael WhitakerMaggoty Lamb2009-08-25T10:21:21ZInky Fingers: Maggoty Lamb finds unexpected common ground between tributes to Steven Wells and Michael Jacksonhttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jul/13/maggoty-lamb-music-press-steven-wells
Swells's lurid imagination would have laughed at the idea of himself as the meat in a Farrah Fawcett/Jacko sandwich<p>To those wending their way sorrowfully to Steven Wells's last published article in the aftermath of his recent death, the fact that <a href="http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/news-and-opinion/in-extremis/Steven-Wells-Says-Goodbye-49054426.html">his final online posting for Philadelphia Weekly</a> ended with a quote from Michael Jackson ("Me? I blame it on sunshine. I blame it on the moonlight. I blame it on the boogie.") added a still more eerie lustre to the virtually synchronous demises of these two titans of 80s pop discourse. </p><p>And while those of his former colleagues who wrote articles to the effect that Wells was the only king of pop they really cared about were of course entitled to <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2009/jun/28/faith-schools-judaism-christianity-catholicism">their personal feelings</a>, I think the man himself would have taken a more positive view of this sombre coincidence.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jul/13/maggoty-lamb-music-press-steven-wells">Continue reading...</a>Pop and rockMusicCultureTue, 14 Jul 2009 09:19:14 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jul/13/maggoty-lamb-music-press-steven-wellsPhotograph: Michael WhitakerSteven Well says goodbye, and NME's editor moves to Top Gear. Photograph: Michael Whitaker.Photograph: Michael WhitakerSteven Well says goodbye, and NME's editor moves to Top Gear. Photograph: Michael Whitaker.Maggoty Lamb2009-07-14T09:19:14ZThe Record Doctor respondshttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jul/12/record-doctor-responds
After years of dealing with celebrity patients, Observer Music Monthly's Record Doctor has extended his working hours and opened his clinic to all-comers. Here are his latest responses to your queries<p><em>I am a retired raver who has started to get cravings for some repetitive beats in my life again. As I'll never see 30 again, I'm quite taken with this <br>balearic/cosmic craze that I keep hearing about, but don't want to make a fool of myself in my local record emporium. Who should I be buying <br>and, more importantly, dancing to? <strong><br>Wroteforluck</strong></em></p><p>Well, Wroteforluck, as anyone who has heard their remixes of Grace Jones's William's Blood and Friendly Fires' Paris will attest, the Belgium-based <a href="http://www.dustedmagazine.com/features/804">Aeroplane</a> (Stephen Fasano and Vito Deluca) are the darlings of the psychedelic disco scene. Their own productions are released on <a href="http://www.eskimorecordings.com/index2.html">Eskimo</a> which, quite frankly, can do little wrong: witness Lindstrom and Prins Thomas's II, a mish-mash of prog rock, disco and Krautrock, and Daniele Baldelli's Cosmic Disco?! Cosmic Rock!, which explores space-age house music's 80s roots. Look out, finally, for Smith &amp; Mudd, whose new album, Le Suivant, is suitably sun-kissed. </p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jul/12/record-doctor-responds">Continue reading...</a>MusicCultureSat, 11 Jul 2009 23:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jul/12/record-doctor-respondsPhotograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverPhotograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverPaul Mardles2009-07-11T23:01:00ZCastlemorton and beyond: Fighting for the right to partyhttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jul/11/castlemorton-free-party-scene-spiral-tribe
For a brief moment in the early 90s, at vast and lawless raves such as Castlemorton, the free-party scene gave a generation a glimpse of an alternative way of life<p>I spent some of the early 90s in squats and fields dancing to acid house and early hardcore, and I spent the last few months chasing up some of the people who organised those parties for this Sunday's Observer Music Monthly, to trace the rise and fall of the free-party movement. I wanted to diagnose outwards from Castlemorton, the UK's largest free-party festival, and an acknowledged turning point in the state's tolerance of the travelling soundsystem movement.<br>The video above captures the whole Castlemorton affair: battered bus convoys (0:40), daisy-shirted ravers (2:02), the dyed hair and dreadlocks (2:43), the free-market theory as applied to whistles and light-sticks (3:21), Vicks inhalers (4:15) and the music (3:43 - Assassinator's Do It Now - bad tune). Plus, it ends with a naked man jumping off a cliff. Good times.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jul/11/castlemorton-free-party-scene-spiral-tribe">Continue reading...</a>Electronic musicMusicCultureSat, 11 Jul 2009 14:07:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jul/11/castlemorton-free-party-scene-spiral-tribeTim Guest2009-07-11T14:07:00ZWas There Then: Vintage Oasis shotshttps://www.theguardian.com/music/gallery/2009/jun/16/oasis
Vintage Oasis prints by celebrated rock photographer Jill Furmanovsky go under the hammer at <a href="http://www.rockarchive.com/news/oasis-vintage-print-collection-by-jill-furmanovsky-at-christies-17-06-2009.html">Christie's</a>. She takes us through some of her best shots <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/gallery/2009/jun/16/oasis">Continue reading...</a>OasisPop and rockMusicCulturePhotographyArtArt and designTue, 16 Jun 2009 12:00:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/gallery/2009/jun/16/oasisPhotograph: Jill FurmanovskyLiam and Noel Gallagher by Jill Furmanovsky Photograph: Jill FurmanovskyPhotograph: Jill FurmanovskyLiam and Noel Gallagher by Jill Furmanovsky Photograph: Jill Furmanovskyguardian.co.uk/music2009-06-16T12:00:00ZThe Record Doctor respondshttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jun/14/record-doctor-responds
After years of dealing with celebrity patients, Observer Music Monthly's Record Doctor has extended his working hours and opened his clinic to all-comers. Here are his latest responses to your queries<p><em>Because I'm on a low income, I tend to buy the same things all the time. I hate old folk music but would probably like some modern stuff if I heard it, and like some Americana I have heard, though I have no idea who is any good. Similarly, I like MIA and Cypress Hill but don't know any other hip-hop acts. Have you any suggestions?<br></em><strong><em>Northern Dave </em></strong></p><p>In terms of Americana, Northern Dave, you could do worse than purchase <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/jan/09/dark-was-the-night">Dark Was the Night</a>, a compilation featuring the genre's biggest names (Bon Iver, Gillian Welch, the National, Iron and Wine), plus a sprinkling of arcane acts (Yeasayer, Andrew Bird) on roots music's fringe. Seek out, too, <a href="http://www.myspace.com/lowanthem">the Low Anthem</a>'s Oh My God Charlie Darwin, which, as you will soon be sick to death of hearing, is 2009's Fleet Foxes – only weirder. <br>Your antipathy towards old folk will be severely tested, I suspect, by the batch of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/jun/10/bert-jansch-jazz-cafe-reivew">Bert Jansch</a> albums recently reissued, especially 1974's LA Turnaround. Of the new folk stars Cortney Tidwell is among the best – her new album, Boys, is folk by way of Mazzy Star and the Cocteau Twins – while Doom's <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/mar/15/doom-born-like-this-review">Born Like This</a> and Q-Tip's <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/music/2008/nov/09/q-tip-the-renaissance-review">The Renaissance</a> should fill that MIA/Cypress Hill-shaped hole in your life.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jun/14/record-doctor-responds">Continue reading...</a>MusicCultureSat, 13 Jun 2009 23:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jun/14/record-doctor-respondsPhotograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverPhotograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverPaul Mardles2009-06-13T23:01:00ZInky Fingers: Maggoty Lamb sobs a distraught 'mea culpa' over the fly-blown corpse of the music presshttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jun/11/maggoty-lamb-music-press
As the death bell tolls for another couple of music titles, is now the time for music journalism to properly embrace the digital blank canvas?<p>Of the several magazines cited approvingly in <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/may/18/maggoty-lamb">last month's despatch for "exulting in the possibilities of the artefact"</a>, one (the bulky American fanzine Skyscraper) <a href="http://www.skyscrapermagazine.com/features/letter.html">had gone web-only </a>before our now metaphorical ink was even dry. Another – Plan B – took just a few days longer to announce that its June issue would be its last.</p><p>Whether we now need to come to terms with the possibility that the artefact no longer has any possibilities, only that venerable gent who lives on top of the pavilion at Lord's cricket ground can testify. But the latter of this brace of unwelcome demises was especially poignant. Not just for the gloomy dignity of (editor and publisher respectively) Louis Pattison and Frances Morgan's "quitting while we're ahead" announcement on the title page – with its defiant refusal to compromise production standards in a bid to escape inextricable linkage with a recorded music industry "currently in freefall", but also because of the exemplary excellence of <a href="http://www.planbmag.com/shop/">Plan B's final edition</a>.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jun/11/maggoty-lamb-music-press">Continue reading...</a>Pop and rockMusicCultureThu, 11 Jun 2009 14:42:28 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jun/11/maggoty-lamb-music-pressPhotograph: Michael WhitakerSo, farewell then ... Plan B and Skyscraper. Photograph: Michael WhitakerPhotograph: Michael WhitakerSo, farewell then ... Plan B and Skyscraper. Photograph: Michael WhitakerMaggoty Lamb2009-06-11T14:42:28ZThe Record Doctor respondshttps://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/may/16/record-doctor
After five years of dealing with celebrity patients, Observer Music Monthly's Record Doctor is extending his working hours and opening his clinic to all-comers. Here are his responses to your queries<p><em>I need to get my head out of 1972. I mostly listen to recently created music, but from the ELO-ish pop of Brendan Benson to the garage punk of the Hives, it's the late 60s/early 70s redux on my playlist. So what's big, strong, crazy and organic-sounding enough to hold my interest without that nagging feeling that I ought to be sharing a spliff with my high-school art teacher?<br></em><br><strong>alaiti</strong></p><p>There is no shame attached, alaiti, to your regard for 1972 (1985: now <em>that</em> was a stinker). But the finest album of the past few months, <a href="http://grizzly-bear.net/newslive.php">Grizzly Bear</a>'s restless Veckatimest, is rooted in what passes for the future round your way – 1975 or thereabouts. Failing that, seek out Primary Colours by <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/apr/19/the-horrors-primary-colours-review">the Horrors</a>, which you might describe as "My Bloody Valentine. On acid" were such trite descriptions still deemed acceptable. Truly, knowing your old art teacher as I do, he'll loathe it. </p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/may/16/record-doctor">Continue reading...</a>MusicCultureFri, 15 May 2009 23:59:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/may/16/record-doctorPhotograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverPhotograph: ObserverThe Record Doctor is in. Photograph: ObserverGuardian Staff2009-05-15T23:59:00ZFind the clues in the story to enter our Damien Hirst competitionhttps://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/08/see-the-light
This day-by-day blog story has been commissioned to accompany our <a href="http://www.observer.co.uk/seethelight">Damien Hirst giveaway competition</a>. Look carefully: following the story will give you vital clues to help solve the competition puzzles<br /><br /><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2009/may/07/see-the-light">Read day 19 of the story here</a><p>Sometimes, you need to leave. And that's what Vic has done. She hasn't killed herself, that's very clear to me. She's gone away, to the place she always wanted to be. If you've been following this story closely you'll know where that is too. But if not, it's OK. Just know that she's safe. She's gone away. What is all this money and success for if it can't buy you the time to heal?</p><p>And now I'm going to find her. I don't know what I'll find when I get there, how she'll be. But I know that she's chosen to live, and that's something. I know that she's chosen to get strong, to throw her pursuers off the scent for a while. People will be angry when they find out she's not dead, I suppose. Funny that: we like our dead martyrs better than the people who find the strength to carry on living. We long to see the skull beneath the skin.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/08/see-the-light">Continue reading...</a>MusicDamien HirstArt and designThu, 07 May 2009 23:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/08/see-the-lightGuardian Staff2009-05-07T23:01:00ZFind the clues in the story to enter our Damien Hirst competitionhttps://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/07/see-the-light
This day-by-day blog story has been commissioned to accompany our <a href="http://www.observer.co.uk/seethelight">Damien Hirst giveaway competition</a>. Look carefully: following the story will give you vital clues to help solve the competition puzzles<br /><br /><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2009/may/06/see-the-light">Read day 18 of the story here</a><p>I went down there yesterday. I had to go. And the police let me through the cordon as long as I promised just to look, not touch, not take anything away. It's all evidence now. <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/audio/2009/apr/16/music-weekly-patrick-wolf">Evidence of something</a>.</p><p>There was a note, scrawled on the back of a glossy image that looked as though it had been torn from an art book. They wouldn't let me turn over the picture to see what was on the other side. But, through the smeared windscreen, I could read:</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/07/see-the-light">Continue reading...</a>MusicDamien HirstArt and designWed, 06 May 2009 23:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/07/see-the-lightGuardian Staff2009-05-06T23:01:00ZFind the clues in the story to enter our Damien Hirst competitionhttps://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/06/see-the-light
This day-by-day blog story has been commissioned to accompany our <a href="http://www.observer.co.uk/seethelight">Damien Hirst giveaway competition</a>. Look carefully: following the story will give you vital clues to help solve the competition puzzles<br /><br /><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2009/may/05/see-the-light">Read day 17 of the story here</a><p>The note must have been pushed through my door in the very early morning. Since the start of spring, I'd been waking up early, 5am or 5.30am, to work on my paintings in the dawn light. It's quiet then, and the colours look more themselves than at any other time of day. I get to hear London waking up, too. Every morning the same slow unfurling of the day, as comforting as the tide because it, too, will be here <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/video/2008/nov/19/hirst-cornucopia-british-museum">long after we are gone</a>. </p><p>But two mornings ago, when I walked downstairs to open the front door, look out at the quiet early morning road, there was a note on the mat. A folded sheet of A4 paper torn from a notebook, my name scrawled on the outside. I knew who'd written it before I even opened it.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/06/see-the-light">Continue reading...</a>MusicDamien HirstArt and designTue, 05 May 2009 23:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/06/see-the-lightGuardian Staff2009-05-05T23:01:00ZFind the clues in the story to enter our Damien Hirst competitionhttps://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/05/see-the-light
This day-by-day blog story has been commissioned to accompany our <a href="http://www.observer.co.uk/seethelight">Damien Hirst giveaway competition</a>. Look carefully: following the story will give you vital clues to help solve the competition puzzles<br /><br /><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2009/may/04/see-the-light">Read day 16 of the story here</a><p>She went back to the clinic a few days later. Where else was there to go? She didn't even try to go quietly this time. It was midday, all cameras blazing, and the newspaper headlines seemed like the most irrelevant thing in the world. Outside, I spotted Mr Mulligrent giving a television interview, the sweat gleaming on his broad forehead under the bright light. </p><p>She stayed longer this time, long enough that I was allowed in for a visit. I had hoped I'd see her changed, looking healthier, happier. But she was grey and jittery, smoking cigarette after cigarette, drinking strong black coffee.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/05/see-the-light">Continue reading...</a>MusicDamien HirstArt and designMon, 04 May 2009 23:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/05/see-the-lightGuardian Staff2009-05-04T23:01:00ZFind the clues in the story to enter our Damien Hirst competitionhttps://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/04/see-the-light
This day-by-day blog story has been commissioned to accompany our <a href="http://www.observer.co.uk/seethelight">Damien Hirst giveaway competition</a>. Look carefully: following the story will give you vital clues to help solve the competition puzzles<br /><br /><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2009/may/03/see-the-light">Read day 15 of the story here</a><p>She stayed that day, alternately giggling and panicking, cycling rapidly from mood to mood. I thought of who I could phone. A doctor? Her manager? Her mother? But if she'd checked herself out of rehab what more could anyone do?</p><p>As the day wore on she began to seem calmer. We looked at <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2006/jan/05/guardianweeklytechnologysection2">some paintings together</a>. It got close to sunset and she said "let's go for a walk." This seemed like a better idea than any of mine.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/04/see-the-light">Continue reading...</a>MusicDamien HirstArt and designSun, 03 May 2009 23:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/04/see-the-lightGuardian Staff2009-05-03T23:01:00ZFind the clues in the story to enter our Damien Hirst competitionhttps://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/03/see-the-light
This day-by-day blog story has been commissioned to accompany our <a href="http://www.observer.co.uk/seethelight">Damien Hirst giveaway competition</a>. Look carefully: following the story will give you vital clues to help solve the competition puzzles<br /><br /><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2009/may/02/see-the-light">Read day 14 of the story here</a><p>So it was time. A quiet clinic, arriving at 5am, before too many photographers were about. A bag filled with expensive cosmetics and magazines and not much else. I thought she might be bored, want to <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/education/2006/jun/28/teacherstvpodcast">learn something new</a>, so I gave her Gombrich's Story of Art to take with her and she laughed and said "you've got a one-track mind, you have", but took it anyway. </p><p>I didn't hear anything. I didn't expect to. She'd told me that when you went to these places they took your phone away. <br>"They think you'll be a bad influence on me, Art Gallery Man."</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/03/see-the-light">Continue reading...</a>MusicDamien HirstArt and designSat, 02 May 2009 23:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/culture/2009/may/03/see-the-lightGuardian Staff2009-05-02T23:01:00Z